Studia Językoznawcze

Having compared the distribution of the colour gold in the poetical output of AdamMickiewicz, Julian Tuwim, Maria Pawlikowska-Jasnorzewska, Stanisław Grochowiakand Zbigniew Herbert with that of Leopold Staff, I conclude that it is by far most widespreadin the poetry of the latter – a classicist. Apart from some standard vocabulary, whichwas commonly used by all seven of the above-mentioned poets (złocisty, złocony, złoto,złoty) and well established in both spoken and written variants of early 19th century Polish,Staff used various lexical individualisms. They were mostly adjectival (often compound),but occasionally also nominal and verbal (in their singular form), e.g.: brzęczyzłotka,przezłacać się, rozzłocić, purpurowozłoty, rudozłoty, złocistokłosy, złotoszczery. Suchfrequent occurence of lexical components designating colour gold provided light reflexesto the pictures painted with the poet’s words. Semantic poetisms, such as: topaz słońca,ciepły bursztyn lasu, dźwignęłaś lasy […] w bursztyn i topazy, etc., deserve a separateattention, since they greatly deepen poeticisation of the landscapes and other elements ofthe represented world. Designations of colour gold are especially prominent in the earlyvolumes of Staff’s poetry, i.e. those published by the 1920’s. In the later period, the poet’suse of the designations of all colours (not only colour gold) becomes increasingly rare,due to Staff’s turn towards more concise and condensed lyrics at the cost of abandoninglonger poetic forms, i.a. his long beloved sonnet.